Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) will suspend its long-running transgender treatment program for children and young adults this summer as pressure from the Trump administration continues to mount.
The Los Angeles hospital’s Center for Transyouth Health and Development informed its nearly 3,000 patient families on Thursday that the center will be closing its doors on July 22, adding that there was “no viable alternative” that would allow the hospital to continue its specialized care, according to a report from the Los Angeles Times on Thursday,
“There is no doubt that this is a painful and significant change to our organization and a challenge to CHLA’s mission, vision, and values,” a Thursday morning email stated from hospital executives to staff.
According to the email, the hospital’s decision to shutter its transgender treatment program “follows a lengthy and thorough assessment of the increasingly severe impacts of federal administrative actions and proposed policies” which led the hospital to briefly pause onboarding new patients into the program this winter.
HOSPITALS NATIONWIDE CHALLENGE TRUMP’S EXECUTIVE ORDER ON TRANSGENDER TREATMENTS FOR MINORS
In January, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to restrict federal funding for “chemical and surgical” sex-change procedures for minors, which is forcing many hospitals around the country to abandon their children’s transgender treatment programs.
“Across the country today, medical professionals are maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions,” states the order, entitled “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation.”
“This dangerous trend will be a stain on our Nation’s history, and it must end,” the order continued.
Some patients and their families expressed outrage over the LA children’s hospital shutting down the program.
“We’re just disappointed and scared and enraged,” Maxine, the mother of a patient currently enrolled in the program, told the LA Times. “The challenge is how we break news to this kid who has had such a positive experience with everybody at Children’s.”
HOSPITALS WARNED THEY MUST PROTECT CHILDREN FROM CHEMICAL AND SURGICAL MUTILATION: HHS AGENCY MEMO
“We’re slowly going underground, underground, underground,” the mother claimed. “You put one thing in place, and then you have to prepare for when that gets taken away. We’re just trying to stay a couple of steps ahead, sticking together with other parents, knowing who our allies are.”
The hospital’s executives stated in their email that federal agencies, including the Department of Justice, Health and Human Services, and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, warned of severe consequences for doctors and hospitals that disobeyed the Trump administration’s executive order banning child transition services.
“Taken together, the Attorney General memo, HHS review, and the recent solicitation of tips from the FBI to report hospitals and providers of GAC strongly signal this Administration’s intent to take swift and decisive action, both criminal and civil, against any entity it views as being in violation of the executive order,” the hospital’s email stated.
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CHLA’s Transyouth Center provides puberty blockers, hormones, and surgical procedures to children. It is one of the nation’s largest transgender youth programs and relies heavily on public funding.
Activists claim that the program’s closure sets a dangerous precedent for other hospitals providing transgender youth treatment across the country.
Fox News’ Alec Schemmel contributed to this report.
